LimeWire

www.limewire.com

LimeWire is a free and open source peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing client for the Gnutella network, which allows users to share files using the Gnutella peer-to-peer protocol.

Features

• Ability to search by artist, title, genre or other meta-information
• Multiple search tabbed interface
• 'Swarm' downloads from multiple hosts help users receive files faster
• iTunes integration for Mac and Windows users
• Integrated chat
• Automatic local network searches for fast downloads

There are two versions of the program: a basic, free version, and an enhanced version available for a small fee, which claims to offer faster downloads. Versions downloaded before April 2004 came bundled with 'LimeShop' (a variant of TopMoxie), which was considered by computer security experts to be spyware. This monitored online purchases. However LimeWire 4.0 (released in May 2004) and all subsequent versions do not have any additional bundled software and are malware-free.

Due to the number of recent lawsuits concerning the sharing copyrighted material, Lime Wire LLC (the company behind LimeWire) has introduced a policy whereby users must agree to the statement "I will not use LimeWire BASIC for copyright infringement" before they are permitted to download the free LimeWire client. It has also been reported that the company is working on a version of the program which will refuse to share files that lack valid license information.